Recent Independent Aspartame Research Results & News

(1998 - 2007)

The results of recent independent research continue the trend of research not funded by
the manufacturer finding serious problems with aspartame ingestion. Details about other
independent research demonstrating the hazards of aspartame ingestion can be found in the
Aspartame FAQs and
Aspartame Scientific Abuse web pages.

An analysis of peer reviewed medical
literature using MEDLINE and other databases was
conducted by Ralph G. Walton, MD, Chairman, The Center for Behavioral Medicine,
Professor of Clinical Psychiatry, Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine.
Dr. Walton analyzed 164 studies which were felt to have relevance to human safety questions.
Of those studies, 74 studies had aspartame industry-related sponsorship and 90 were funded
without any industry money.

Of the 90 non-industry-sponsored studies, 83 (92%) identified one or more problems with
aspartame. Of the 7 studies which did not find a problems, 6 of those studies were
conducted by the FDA. Given that a number of FDA officials went to work for the aspartame
industry immediately following approval (including the former FDA Commissioner), many
consider these studies to be equivalent to industry-sponsored research.

Of the 74 aspartame industry-sponsored studies, all 74 (100%) claimed that no problems
were found with aspartame. This is reminiscent of tobacco industry research where it is
primarily the tobacco research which never finds problems with the product, but nearly
all of the independent studies do find problems.

The 74 aspartame industry-sponsored studies are those which one inveriably sees cited in
PR/news reports and reported by organizations funded by Monsanto/Benevia/NutraSweet
(e.g., IFIC, ADA). These studies have severe design deficiencies which help to guarantee
the "desired" outcomes. These design deficiencies may not be apparent to the inexperienced
scientist. Healthcare practitioners and scientists should print out the all of the
documents on the
Monsanto/NutraSweet Scientific Abuse web page, the
Scientific FAQs web page and the
Aspartame Toxicity Reaction Report Samples. Please refer scientific questions
to mgold@holisticmed.com.

"This study confirmed the previous study by Dr. Trocho and co-workers, which also found the
formaldehyde breakdown product of aspartame to be damaging to cellular DNA and that this
damage was accumulative. The type of damage was a duplicate of that associated with cancers.
Along with this most recent study, this means that drinking a single diet cola sweetened with
aspartame every day could increase one's risk of developing a lymphoma or leukemia.

"They also found an increased incidence of malignant brain tumors, even though it was not
statistically significant. This does not mean there is no association to brain tumors,
since only the animals exposed to aspartame developed the tumors. With children and pregnant
women drinking the largest amount of diet colas, this puts their children at the greatest
risk of developing one of these horrible diseases. Their study found that even low doses
of aspartame could cause these malignancies; yet, the higher the dose, the more cancers
that were seen."

A followup study was published in Environmental Health Perspectives showing that there
was a significant increase in cancer of the kidney and peripheral nerves. The full
published study can be found in PDF format at:
http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/members/2005/8711/8711.pdf.